"Experiences for the Future": exhibition of Alexander Rodchenko in Mamm. Stories of great photographers

The Soviet master of photography Alexander Rodchenko is known as one of the founders of constructivism and the creation of a completely new direction - design. For many years he worked with his wife, the artist Varvara Stepanova, doing photography, painting, drawing, book design, sculpture and advertising design at the same time.

In photography, Rodchenko put the documentary and realism of the created images in the first place. He is the pioneer in the field of experiments with foreshortened composition of the frame and photographic points.

Alexander Mikhailovich Rodchenko was born in 1891, his father worked as a theater props. At first, he studied as a dental technician, but his passion for painting eventually overpowered him, and Rodchenko entered the Kazan Art School. It was there that he met his future wife, Varvara Stepanova, with whom he subsequently made many joint art projects.

Rodchenko was actively interested in painting and worked on creating abstract compositions. For some time he devoted himself to the so-called industrial art, which involved the creation of utilitarian objects without any artistic content.

After the revolution of 1917, Rodchenko became one of the secretaries of the trade union of painters in Moscow, organizing the necessary conditions for the work of young artists. During this period, he tries his hand at decorating the Pittoresk cafe in Moscow and at the same time manages the Museum Bureau. His life in art is a constant experiment associated with the creation of completely new graphic, pictorial and spatial projects.

In painting, Rodchenko introduced lines and dots as independent pictorial forms, in the field of creating spatial forms - folding and disassembling structures from flat cardboard elements. In the early 1920s, he was involved in teaching, teaching his students the basics of creating multifunctional objects for everyday life and public buildings.

Creative experiments gradually led Rodchenko to photography, which he considered an absolutely necessary means of expression for any contemporary artist. His portrait and reportage shots, as well as interesting collages using both his own photographs and clippings from magazines, immediately attracted attention to him.

Photographs of Rodchenko began to be published in such publications as Vechernyaya Moskva, Sovetskoe Foto, Give, Pioneer, and Ogonyok. With a reputation as an innovator in photography, Alexander Rodchenko soon received an offer from Vladimir Mayakovsky to illustrate his books. Rodchenko made several photo montages for the design of the 1923 edition of Mayakovsky's poem "About It", which even served as the beginning of a new trend in modern art - book illustration and design.

Two years later, at the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and industrial arts in Paris, Rodchenko's advertising posters were awarded a silver medal. At the same time, he turned to classical portrait photography in photography - portraits of Mayakovsky, Aseev, Tretyakov, Melnikov and other representatives of art. In the magazine "Soviet Cinema" in 1926, his first foreshortened photographs of buildings were also published, including a series of photographs "House on Myasnitskaya" and "House of Mosselprom".

What distinguished Alexander Rodchenko from other photographers of the 1920s? The fact is that photography of that time was characterized by the creation of images with a horizontal composition and a rectilinear foreshortening. The photographs were dominated mainly by static sculptural compositions that did not evoke great emotions in the viewer.

Rodchenko was the first in Soviet photography to call for abandoning such dogmas in favor of images that describe life as realistically as possible. That is why he constantly experimented with angles and shooting points in order to catch this or that object in those moments that would make up its essence, movement.

In photography, Rodchenko sought to reveal the content of an object or a whole phenomenon. To do this, he skillfully "played" with photography angles, used contrasting chiaroscuro and worked on the original compositional construction of the frame.

Alexander Rodchenko entered the history of Russian and world photography as the author of unique photographs taken from a variety of angles, in an unusual and unusual angle for the human eye. He believed that every photographer should “remove the veil from the eyes, called “from the navel” ... and shoot “from all points except the navel until all points are recognized.”

In the 1930s, Alexander Rodchenko worked as a photojournalist for the Izogiz publishing house and as a graphic designer for the magazine "USSR in Construction", which allowed him to take part in a trip to the White Sea-Baltic Canal, where he took a series of reportage photographs. After a series of government propaganda projects inspired by the spirit of the times and revolutionary romanticism, Rodchenko became interested in sports photography and photography of the unusual world of the circus.

AT post-war years from photography he returned to painting and decoration. However, his original work soon came into conflict with the position of the official authorities, and in 1951 Rodchenko was expelled from the Union of Artists.

Alexander Rodchenko died in December 1956 in Moscow and was buried on Donskoy cemetery. In photography, he is often compared to Edward Weston and Tina Modotti. In many ways, the school of Soviet photography created with his participation opened up many new outstanding names - Arkady Shaikhet, Max Alpert, and others.

In 1998, the Museum of Modern Art in New York hosted a large-scale exhibition of works by Alexander Rodchenko, which included all of his best projects in the field of painting, graphics and photography.

Alexander Rodchenko - Life and photography

Pioneer trumpeter 1930

Alexander Rodchenko was born in 1891 in the family of a theatrical props. His father did not want his son to follow in his footsteps, and tried with all his might to give the boy a “real” profession. In his autobiographical notes, Rodchenko recalled: “In Kazan, when I was 14 years old, I climbed onto the roof in the summer and wrote a diary in small books, full of sadness and longing from my uncertain position, I wanted to learn to draw, but they taught me to be a dental technician ...” The future photographer - the avant-garde artist even managed to work for two years in the technical prosthetic laboratory of the Kazan Dental School of Dr. O.N. Natanson, but at the age of 20 he left medicine and entered the Kazan Art School, and then the Moscow Stroganov School, which opened the way for him to independent creative life. Rodchenko did not immediately turn to photography.

self-portrait
In the mid-1910s, he was actively engaged in painting, and his abstract compositions took part in many exhibitions. A little later, he showed his talent in a new field, taking part in the design of the Pittoresk cafe in Moscow, and for some time even abandoned painting, turning to "production art" - a trend that, in its extreme form, denied art and turned purely to the creation of utilitarian objects.

Summer day 1929

In addition, in the late tenths and early twenties, the young artist participated in many public life: he became one of the organizers of the trade union of painters, served in the department of fine arts of the People's Commissariat for Education, and headed the Museum Bureau. Rodchenko's first steps in the field of photography date back to the early 1920s, when he, at that time theater artist and the designer, faced with the need to capture their work on film. Having discovered a new art for himself, Rodchenko was completely fascinated by it - however, in photography, as in painting, at that time he was more interested in “pure composition”, exploring how objects located on a plane influence each other.

Shukhov tower.1929

It is worth noting that Rodchenko was more fortunate as a photographer than as an artist - the former was recognized more quickly. Pretty soon, the young photographer established a reputation as an innovator by making a series of collages and montages using his own photographs and magazine clippings. Rodchenko's works were published in the Soviet Photo and Novy LEF magazines, and Mayakovsky invited him to illustrate his books. Photomontages by Rodchenko, used in the design of the publication of Mayakovsky's poem "About this" (1923), literally became the beginning of a new genre.

Mother's portrait 1924

Since 1924, Rodchenko increasingly turned to classical areas photography - portrait and reportage - however, even here the restless innovator did not allow the established traditions to dictate terms to himself. The photographer created his own canons, which ensured his work a place of honor in any modern photography textbook. An example is a series of portraits of Mayakovsky, in which Rodchenko abandoned all the traditions of pavilion photography, or “Portrait of a Mother” (1924), which has become a close-up classic.

Vladimir Mayakovsky 1924

The photographer also made a great contribution to the development of the genre of photo reportage - it was Alexander Rodchenko who was the first to use multiple shooting of a person in action, which allows you to get a collective documentary-figurative idea of ​​​​the model. Rodchenko's photo reports were published in a number of central publications: the newspaper Vechernyaya Moskva, the magazines 30 Days, Give, Pioneer, Ogonyok, and Radio Listener. However, foreshortened pictures became Rodchenko's real "calling card" - the artist went down in history with photographs taken at an unusual angle, from an unusual and often unique point, from a perspective that distorts and "revives" ordinary objects. For example, the photographs taken by Rodchenko from the rooftops (upper angle) are so dynamic that it seems as if the figures of people are about to begin to move, and the camera will float over the city, revealing a breathtaking panorama - it is not surprising that the first foreshortened shots of buildings (the series Myasnitskaya", 1925 and "House of Mosselprom", 1926) were published in the magazine "Soviet Cinema".

House of Mosselprom 1932

Around the same time, Rodchenko made his debut as a photography theorist: since 1927, in the journal Novy LEF, of which he was a member of the editorial board, the artist began to publish not only pictures, but also articles (“To the photo in this issue”, “ Ways of Modern Photography”, etc.) However, for the early 1930s, some of his experiments seemed too bold: in 1932, the opinion was expressed that Rodchenko’s famous Pioneer Trumpeter, taken from the bottom point, looked like a “fat bourgeois”, and he himself the artist does not want to reorganize himself in accordance with the tasks of proletarian photography. Filming the construction of the White Sea Canal in 1933 really forced Rodchenko to rethink the relationship between art and reality, which seemed less and less inspiring to the artist. It was at this time that the unprecedented construction sites of socialism and the new Soviet reality began to give way to the special world of sports and the magical reality of the circus in Rodchenko's photographs. Rodchenko devoted a whole series of unique series to the latter - the pictures were to be included in a special issue of the USSR at a Construction Site magazine. Unfortunately, the issue was signed for publication five days before the start of the Great Patriotic War and never saw the light of day. In the post-war years, Rodchenko worked extensively as a designer and returned to painting, although he still often turned to his favorite genre of photo reportage. His "non-standard" work still aroused certain doubts in official circles - the disagreements between the artist and the authorities ended in 1951 with the expulsion of Rodchenko from the Union of Artists. However, just three years later, in 1954, the artist was again reinstated in this organization. On December 3, 1956, Alexander Rodchenko died of a stroke in Moscow and was buried at the Donskoy Cemetery.

Actress Yulia Solntseva 1930

Varvara Stepanova 1924

Architect Melnikov on the balcony of his house 1929

Architect, painter, decorator Alexander Vesnin 1924

Behind the worms The boys are in the boat. Karelia 1933

Apparatus for projection of the starry sky 1929

Jump into the water 1932

Poet Nikolai Aseev 1927

Red Army maneuvers 1924

Writer and critic Osip Brik, one of the founders of LEF magazine

Sukharev Tower 1928

Pioneer 1930

Discus Thrower 1937

Monument to Pushkin 1930

Nikolai Aseev in Rodchenko's studio 1924

Vladimir Mayakovsky 1924

Vladimir Mayakovsky 1924

Actress Yulia Solntseva 1930

Railway bridge 1926

Vladimir Mayakovsky 1924

Vladimir Mayakovsky. 1924

Football 1937

Newsstand 1929

Glass from the series Glass and Light 1928

Worker 1929 = AMO plant

Planetarium 1932

Radio listener. Reportage. 1929

Jump into the water 1932

Renault Mayakovsky 1929

Nurse 1930

Plane Maxim Gorky over Red Square 1935

Directed by Alexander Dovzhenko 1930

Gathering for a demonstration 1928

Gathering for a demonstration 1928

Newspaper essay. Aunt Paula-courier (V.Stepanova) 1928

Stereotypes. From the series Essay on a Newspaper 1928

Pedestrians 1928

Film director Lev Kuleshov 1927

Balconies. From the series House on Myasnitskaya 1925

Make way for a woman 1934

Architect Melnikov at the exit of the Bakhmetevsky bus depot built according to his project in 1929

From the life of the first Russian designer and master of photography

the site starts a big project “50 most important photographers of our time”. We will talk about photographers who had a great influence on the development of photographic art. About the authors who formed the concept of “modern photography” with their works. About the great masters of their craft, whose names and works are simply necessary to know.

Strangely, most commercial photographers don't think about the roots of their profession, focusing only on colleagues or a couple of randomly familiar names in their work. But in this sense, our profession differs little from the profession of, say, an artist. Ask the master of the brush if he knows anyone from famous artists- most likely, in response you will hear a short lecture on painting, in which the interlocutor will talk about his favorite artistic styles, schools, most likely will accompany the story with a mass of dates, surnames and references to works. Yes, most artists have a special education (at least at the level of an art school), where they learn about all this. But to a greater extent, it is, of course, self-education. Artists need to know the global context, because it is impossible to create works in isolation from the work of great masters, without knowing the basics. So why do photographers think differently?

The first professional on our list is a great Russian artist and photographer Alexander Rodchenko.

Even if you try to describe the activities of Alexander Rodchenko exclusively in #tags, you get several pages of text. The most important member of the Russian avant-garde, artist, sculptor, graphic artist, photographer ... And much more.

Rodchenko was born in St. Petersburg, studied at the Kazan art school them. Feshin, where he met his future wife, a talented artist Varvara Stepanova. Subsequently, he held a number of important positions, among which, the post of chairman of the Institute artistic culture(in this post he replaced another great artist - Wassily Kandinsky)

“Work for life, not for palaces, temples, cemeteries and museums”

This was his motto, fully reflecting the mood of the avant-garde artists of that time. Rejecting “decoration” and going against the aesthetic criteria of art, they endowed their works - from paintings to architectural forms - with many details, each of which had an important, constructive function. Hence the name of one of the main areas of their work - constructivism. “The art of the future,” said Rodchenko, “will not be a cozy decoration for family apartments. It will be equal in necessity to 48-story skyscrapers, grandiose bridges, wireless telegraph, aeronautics, submarines, and so on.”

Rodchenko began his work at a time of great change: outside the window was what would later be called the Leninist Soviet project. Hopes for a bright communist future were inspiring.

Rodchenko and photomontage

Among other things, Rodchenko is famous for his experiments in the field of photomontage - he was actually a pioneer of this art in Russia. A sort of master of Photoshop, but in the days of the USSR. It must be understood that Rodchenko, as a true communist and supporter of the Soviet regime, tried to direct his abilities to strengthening the new order of life, therefore he was happy to engage in propaganda activities. So, it was in the technique of photomontage that the most interesting and memorable propaganda posters of that time were designed. Masterfully combining text boxes, black-and-white photographs and color images, Rodchenko did what would now be called poster design - by the way, he is often called the ancestor of design and advertising in Russia. It was Rodchenko Mayakovsky who entrusted the design of his book “About It”.

Rodchenko and photography

Rodchenko, like all Russian avant-garde artists, experimented with forms and technology. So he took up photography, moreover, reportage photography. Using unexpected angles (the term "Rodchenko angle" is often found in art history literature), forcing the viewer to twist the prints in front of the eyes (or the head in front of the prints) and creating images that seem to be about to start moving, he has established himself as one of the most progressive and pioneering photographers of the time. Although then there were, frankly, fewer of them (photographers) than now. Rodchenko plays with the visual means of photography, honing them to the limit. Rhythmic pattern, compositionally perfect interweaving of lines - he masterfully manages all this. He was one of the first to use multiple shots of an object in action - storyboarding. Rodchenko was not afraid to violate the recently established photographic canons - he made portraits from the bottom up or deliberately “filled up the horizon”. With his photographic “eye”, he seemed to strive to cover the entire Soviet Union. Perhaps that is why he took many pictures (especially reportage shots from demonstrations) while standing on stairs, roofs, or being in other non-obvious points.

Rodchenko continued his experiments even after the "death" of the avant-garde project - but under socialist realism and Stalin this was no longer encouraged. In 1951 he was even expelled from the Union of Artists and rehabilitated only in 1954 - 2 years before his death.

Today the name of Alexander Rodchenko bears the most important educational institution in the area of visual arts- “Moscow School of Photography and Multimedia”.

Rodchenko was called in the middle of the 20th century the genius of Soviet propaganda. He was a talented, creative master. Alexander Rodchenko stood at the origins of the avant-garde in the USSR. It was he who set the newest standards for advertising and design, destroyed the old ideas about graphics, posters, and created a new course in this direction. Behind all sides of this creative personality is such a facet as photography, and not everyone knows about it. Rodchenko knew how to catch interesting moments and create unique masterpieces.

More than a photographer

In the 1920s, Alexander Rodchenko began to create his first photographic works. He was a unique photographer. At that time he worked in the theater as an artist-designer. He had a need to fix the work on film, and so he discovered a new art that completely captivated and fascinated him. The main contribution of Alexander Rodchenko to the development of the photographic genre was the first multiple shots of a person in action. So he collected documentary-figurative representations of models. His unusual photo reports were published in all popular central publications: in the magazines "Spark", "Pioneer", "Radio listener", "30 days", in the newspaper "Evening Moscow".

Alexander Rodchenko. Photography is art

Photographs taken with different angles(angled). With these pictures, the master went down in history. The images were made under an unusual perception angle, often from a unique unusual point. The angle to a certain extent distorts, changes the perception of an ordinary object. For example, the photos taken by the artist from the rooftops are so dynamic that it seems as if the image is about to move. It is not surprising that such a series of photographs was first published in the Soviet Cinema magazine.

Rodchenko set such canons in photography, which have taken pride of place in modern photography textbooks. So, for example, when performing a series of portraits of Mayakovsky, the photographer completely departed from the standards of ordinary pavilion photography. But in the 1930s, some of his experiments seemed too bold to the authorities. The photograph from the bottom of the famous "Pioneer Trumpeter" seemed to some to be bourgeois. The boy in this perspective looked like a kind of "fat" bad boy. The artist here did not enter the framework of proletarian photography.

Alexander Rodchenko, biography

In 1891, Alexander Rodchenko was born in St. Petersburg into a simple, humble family. Father's name was Mikhail Mikhailovich (1852-1907), he served as a theatrical props. Mother, Olga Evdokimovna (1865-1933), worked as a laundress. Due to the circumstances, the family in 1902 moved to permanent place residence in the city of Kazan. Here Alexander received his first education at the Kazan parish elementary school.

Alexander Rodchenko (USSR, 1891-1956) was a member of the "Zhivskulptarkh" society since 1919. In 1920 he was a member of the Rabis development group. In the 1920s-1930s, he was a teacher as a professor at the metalworking and woodworking faculties. He taught students to design multifunctional objects, to achieve expressive forms by identifying design features.

photo activity

In the 1920s, Rodchenko was actively involved in photography. In 1923, to illustrate Mayakovsky's books "About this", he used photomontage. Since 1924, he became known for his psychological portraits of friends, relatives and acquaintances ("Portrait of a Mother", Mayakovsky, Tretyakov, Brik). In 1925-1926 he published foreshortened photographs from the series "House of Mosselprom", "House on Myasnitskaya". He published articles about photography, where he promoted a documentary view of the world, advocated the need to use new methods, the development of different points of view (lower, upper) in the photo. Participated in the exhibition in 1928 "Soviet photography".

Alexander Rodchenko became a famous master of photography thanks to the use of various angles in photography. In 1926-1928 he worked as a production designer in cinema ("Moscow in October", "Journalist", "Albidum"). In 1929, based on Glebov's play, he designed the play "Inga" at the Theater of the Revolution.

30s

Alexander Rodchenko, whose work seems to be bifurcated in the 30s, on the one hand, is engaged in propaganda of socialist realism, on the other, he tries to preserve his own freedom. Photo reports about the circus, created in the late 1930s, become its symbol. He returns during this period to easel painting. In the 1940s, Rodchenko painted decorative compositions made in abstract expressionism.

The 1930s are marked by the transition from the early comprehensive works to the concrete creativity of Soviet propaganda, which are completely imbued with revolutionary enthusiasm. In 1933, the photographer was sent to the construction site of the White Sea Canal, where he took many reportage photographs (about two thousand), but now only thirty are known.

Later, together with his wife Stepanova, the albums "First Cavalry", "15 Years of Kazakhstan", "Soviet Aviation", "Red Army" were designed. Since 1932 Rodchenko was a member of the Union of Artists. In 1936, he took part in an exhibition of masters of Soviet photography. Since 1928, he regularly sent his works to exhibitions in the salons of France, the USA, Great Britain, Spain and other countries.

Alexander Rodchenko, recalling his childhood, says that when he was 14 years old, he sadly wrote in his diary about the uncertainty in life. He was sent to study medicine, and he longingly dreamed of becoming a real artist. In the end, at the age of 20, Alexander left medicine and went to study at an art school. In 1916, he will be drafted into the army, and yet medical studies will do him good. He will be appointed head of the hospital train instead of being sent to the front.

In the 1920s, Rodchenko, together with his wife, organized a creative union. They developed a "new way of life", combined many artistic techniques and arts. Designed together new model clothes - now it's overalls. It was intended to hide gender differences between the generations of the future, to praise the labor activity of the Soviet people. In 1925, the first and last trip abroad took place in the life of the master, he was sent to Paris. There he designed the department of the USSR during the International Exhibition.

last years of life

After the war, Alexander Rodchenko fell into a depression, the entries in his diary are only pessimistic. In 1947, he complains that life is getting more boring every day. They stopped providing work with Varvara. A period of lack of money has begun. As the author himself said, it remains only to pray to God. In 1951, Rodchenko was even expelled from the Union of Artists, however, four years later he was restored, but it was too late, the artist stopped creating. He died in 1956, December 3. Alexander Rodchenko was buried at the Donskoy cemetery.

A painting that is listed in some international auction catalogs as "oil painting on cardboard". In the lower right corner of the artifact, the signature “A. Rodchenko" and the year of creation - 1919. The canvas is made in the style of Suprematism, the fashionable trend of the Russian avant-garde at that time. On bright red dyed cardboard, several crossed parallel lines and a hexagon. A small picture (dimensions 22x16 cm) is inserted into a wooden frame. The safety is satisfactory. The alleged author of this canvas, Alexander Mikhailovich Rodchenko, entered the annals of world art as brilliant artist and a photographer who created a new direction in photography, design and advertising of his time. However, for all his talent, Rodchenko was still an unsurpassed propagandist who sang of the Stalinist regime and its “conquests”. However, he was not alone in this regard. Very many Soviet talents - some voluntarily, some involuntarily - were forced to be in the service of the dictatorship.

Picture from the collection "Little stories"

Alexander Pushkin, as you know, argued that genius and villainy are incompatible. But if in one person the possibility of such a combination can really be questioned, then what if the villain sits on the throne, and the genius lives and longs to create - even in the territory controlled by the villain?
However, in the post-revolutionary year 1919, which dates our artifact, hardly any of the young Suprematist artists, to whom Rodchenko considered himself, asked this question. The old world was crumbling, to the horror of some and the joy of others. For representatives of the "new art" it was rather a time of hope. The severity of life - namely, in 1919, the Bolsheviks launched a massive "Red Terror", the peasants rebelled against the announced surplus appraisal, Denikin occupied the Crimea, Yudenich was in charge in Pskov, Kolchak went to the Volga, and the Entente announced a campaign against the Soviet Republic - only emphasized the huge scale of what was happening in a land of change. What's there - many seriously expected that the "flame of revolution" was about to be transferred from Soviet Russia to other countries ( for more details on how the USSR tried to “ignite the fire of the world revolution” - in history), and therefore the revolution was seen everywhere and everywhere. Including in art. And although Alexander Rodchenko was already 28 years old that year, it was he who was to become one of the main "revolutionaries" of Soviet painting and photography.

Alexander Rodchenko was born in 1891 in St. Petersburg in the family of a theatrical props and laundress. Soon the family moved to Kazan, where Alexander, at the insistence of his parents, studied as a dental prosthetist, but at the same time learned the basics of painting - he was a volunteer at the Kazan Art School. Here he met the future "Amazon of the Russian avant-garde", artist-designer Varvara Stepanova. Varvara Feodorovna will soon become his wife - their fruitful creative tandem will last almost 40 years. The aspiring ambitious artist immediately decided to seek application for his talents in Moscow. In 1914, he tried to enter the Stroganov School of Industrial Art, but was unsuccessful. However, the failure did not discourage Alexander from becoming an artist - he began to study painting on his own, from books. Stubborn self-taught Rodchenko already in 1916 made his debut in the capital as a painter and graphic artist - at the exhibition of the Russian avant-garde "Shop", organized by the artist Vladimir Tatlin, Alexander exhibited several of his cubo-futuristic works, a series theatrical costumes and graphic compositions.

Immersed in a stormy whirlpool artistic life capital, Rodchenko was carried away by literally all modern trends in painting - the first two decades of the 20th century saw the heyday of the Russian avant-garde in all its unthinkable manifestations. The works of modernist Aubrey Beardsley, the futuristic canvases of Vladimir Tatlin, the Suprematism of Kazimir Malevich are dizzying Alexander's head... Everything new in art and life will captivate and intoxicate young innovative artists, among whom Rodchenko found himself. The avant-gardists identified their most daring artistic fantasies with the impending proletarian revolution, and therefore they vividly responded to its call by actively participating in the events. cultural life, decorating cities, creating posters and posters. "We glorify aloud the revolution as the only engine of life" Rodchenko announced. In April 1918, he addressed his fellow proletarian artists with the following appeal:

“We are the proletarians of the brush! Creators - Martyrs! Downtrodden artists!
We, who bear the blazing fire of creativity, go hungry and barefoot!
We, who do not have the opportunity to create, give our best strength and time to earn money for a meager subsistence!
We, huddled in kennels, often have neither colors, nor light, nor time for creativity.
Proletarians of the brush, we must rally, we must organize a “free association of oppressed painters” and demand bread, workshops and the right to exist.

Rodchenko's handwritten poster "Rejoice, today the revolution of the spirit is before you...". 1919.

The "revolutionary fire" of the Bolsheviks and the "flaming fire of creativity" of the proletarians fed and complemented each other. So it is not at all surprising that Rodchenko accepted the revolution without the slightest hesitation. "We went to work with the Bolsheviks", Alexander frankly wrote in his memoirs. And there was a lot of work: from 1917 to 1920, Rodchenko was engaged in decorating Moscow for proletarian holidays, arranged thematic exhibitions, and participated in the first competitions of the young republic for emblems for trade unions. He also became the organizer of the trade union of painters, where he was elected secretary of the Young Federation, served in the department of fine arts of the People's Commissariat of Education, headed the Museum Bureau, was a member of the art board and the Zhivskulptarh society, participated in the creation of Rabis, taught at VKHUTEMAS-VKHUTEIN . In general, under the new regime, Rodchenko lived quite well, Alexander no longer felt like an "oppressed artist" - he accepted the Soviet government, and the Soviet government accepted him with open arms. And although Rodchenko’s paintings were extremely far from what would later be called “socialist realism,” this did not bother anyone in the 1920s: the new proletarian art was looking for new forms, and its main task at this stage was to distance itself as much as possible from “ bourgeois art. Today we know that very little time will pass, and everything will change places: avant-garde works will become absolutely bourgeois, and socialist realism will be planted in the USSR. But in 1919 there was an active search for new forms in art, and Rodchenko is one of the main ones here.

It was during this period that the “oil painting on cardboard” presented in our collection appeared - apparently, it was simply difficult to give another name to the canvas. Let's consider it more closely. In the years 1915-1920, graphic works created with the help of a compass, a ruler and a stencil prevailed in the work of Alexander Mikhailovich - when writing our canvas, it was clearly not possible without these drawing tools. You will not be able to recognize in these images even a remote resemblance to anything. The so-called "pointless" paintings by Rodchenko were born under the influence of the Suprematist ideas of Kazimir Malevich. According to the definition of the creator of the Black Square, Suprematism is the highest stage in the development of art on the path to the ultimate identification of the non-objective as the essence of any art. And on the way to this higher level Rodchenko, following Malevich, deprived his works of any pictorial meaning - so that in combinations of colored planes, in a combination of geometric shapes and lines of different sizes, one should not look for familiar outlines. The Suprematists believed that their paintings were the first step of "pure creativity", that is, an act that equalized the creative power of Man and Nature (God). And in this creative competition with the Creator himself, obviously, such trifles as the size of the canvas and its quality did not matter. Those who see the most famous painting by Malevich for the first time are usually sincerely surprised by the modest dimensions of the square (79.5x79.5 cm). The presented work by Rodchenko can be called a miniature (22x16 cm). It was made in oil on a simple "proletarian" cardboard, and not on a "bourgeois" canvas.
Rodchenko in general always showed an increased interest in the color and structure of the painted surface, he was concerned about the transmission of strong light sensations. That is why he did not stay long in Suprematism with its “non-objectiveness”. In fact, Alexander became interested in the design approach to painting. To emphasize his individuality, in contrast to the paintings of Malevich, Rodchenko wrote a series of works "Black on Black" and "White on White". By the time his wife Varvara Stepanova aptly and caustically remarked, "the general mood was not to succumb to the influence of Malevich." There is very little left before Rodchenko's farewell to painting. Alexander very effectively finished with her in 1921 - his last landmark work was the triptych “Three Colors. Yellow. Red. Blue".

« last picture» A. Rodchenko. 1921

These are three squares painted over with the corresponding colors - the answer to the same Malevich with his black square abyss, in which each viewer sees and understands something of his own. There is no such depth in Rodchenko's three squares. These are just colored figures, without any meaning - you don’t need to think of anything. In these squares, the rejection is not only of the subject of the image, but also of any "spiritual content". In Western catalogs, the triptych is listed as "The Last Picture". Art is dead, Rodchenko sums up, as it were, and puts an end to his easel painting. However, as it turns out later, not forever - in 20 years he will again take up brushes. In the meantime, Alexander is not just an artist, but an artist-engineer or, as he called himself, a production artist.

In March 1921, the stage of Rodchenko as a constructivist began: in contrast to the non-objectives, it was the creation of new objects that turned into the most important artistic task for him. Rodchenko and Stepanova were among the founders of constructivism, an avant-garde style designed to model the world of the socialist future in engineering. At the 5X5=25 exhibition, Alexander exhibited a series of free-hanging spatial structures, consisting of planes of various configurations cut into each other, which were easy to dismantle. Then Rodchenko submitted three versions of the kiosk to the competition, in the bare frame of which he saw an innovative architectural form with new artistic and functional possibilities. After that, there were projects for the building of the House of Soviets, a public building of a fundamentally new type, etc. " It's time for art to integrate into life in an organized way. Down with art as a precious stone in the dirty dark life of the poor. Work for life, not for palaces, temples and museums!” such were the slogans of Rodchenko the constructivist.

And it is quite logical that the new government really liked the creative experiments of Rodchenko, who proclaimed the goal of industrial art to be the communist expression of material structures. Rodchenko and Stepanov even called their book on constructivism “Manifesto” in the communist manner. In it, the artists called for the abolition "aesthetic, philosophical and religious outgrowths on art"- you must admit, these were sweet speeches for the Bolshevik ear. “The art of the future will not be a cozy decoration for family apartments. It will be equal in necessity to 48-story skyscrapers, grandiose bridges, wireless telegraph, aeronautics, submarines, and so on. Rodchenko wrote. He openly declared his commitment to Marxist materialism, rejected art as an object of bourgeois consumption, replacing it with the so-called "intellectual products". In other words, Alexander urged to organically connect art with life through production, to direct the artistic potential to create household items mass production - to create a new socialist environment. Such a person was simply necessary for the Soviet government.
Oddly enough, the work of Soviet constructivists was received with great interest in the West as well. Their work was identified with the progressive ideology of post-revolutionary Russia, with the "art of the material culture of the technical age"'. Similar ideas fueled the movement in the West known as International Constructivism. The views of many progressive artists in the 20s of the 20th century were focused precisely on Soviet Russia, which at that time was considered a political and artistic landmark. Even today, many art historians believe that Russian culture only once made an outstanding contribution to the world treasury of mankind - and it was precisely thanks to the Russian avant-garde of the 1910s-1920s, one of the key figures of which was the author of the canvas presented in our collection.

Poster A. Rodchenko with sketches of women's clothing

Rodchenko and Stepanova literally gushed with new ideas in the 1920s. It was they who became the creators of the so-called prozoodezhda - suits of "industrial-mass production" for Soviet citizens. The design of this garment was intended to destroy all its decorative properties - hard time demanded function, not aesthetics. Out of more than a hundred sketches by Stepanova, about 20 went into production, and in the summer of 1924 all of Moscow wore constructivist fabrics with constructivist patterns. At that time, Rodchenko created a poster for a German film that was shown in Russia under the title "Six girls are looking for shelter." The drawing was made as a textile rapport - two repeating female figures, one in a cloche hat, the other with short haircut. Their bodies are covered with prozoodet made of striped fabric, only the legs in pumps are visible. Rodchenko's women's outfits were sets, individual parts of which were easily replaceable. Designed by Alexander Mikhailovich, men's overalls, in which, by the way, he was often photographed, were also as functional as possible. Cap - for protection from the weather, pockets - for tools, trousers and sleeves - wide ... Freedom of movement was the main condition for a fashionable proletarian dress.

Rodchenko was looking for a rational form not only for clothes. He created samples of typographic fonts and illustrations for a number of publishing houses, as well as for the magazines Kino-Fot, Ogonyok, Change, Book and Revolution, Pioneer, Modern Architecture. Rodchenko's titles to Dziga Vertov's Kino-Pravda, with their catchiness and dynamism, visually very intelligibly "voiced" the silent newsreel. Alexander Mikhailovich also designed tea packages, candy wrappers, developed sketches for furniture, porcelain, transferring his proletarian geometric compositions to dishes. It can be said without exaggeration that Rodchenko's style of constructivist design left its mark on the entire everyday environment of the 1920s.

Special mention deserves the work of Rodchenko in advertising. He created more than 100 posters, many with Vladimir Mayakovsky, who in this duet of "advertising-constructors" called himself a copywriter. Advertising for Mosselprom and Rezinotrest, distinguished by a laconic solution of composition and block type from Rodchenko and etched in memory slogans from the main proletarian poet of the Land of Soviets, is still included in the basic design curriculum. A feature of Rodchenko's advertising design was the interweaving of graphic and conceptual-sign elements in the composition - for example, in the form of pointer arrows, emphasizing the figurativeness of Mayakovsky's couplets.

The popularity of this new Soviet advertisement was enormous; it immediately overwhelmed the previously dominant "artistic" NEP movement. “We completely conquered Moscow and completely shifted, or rather, changed the old tsarist-bourgeois-Western style of advertising to a new, Soviet one,”- Rodchenko recalled this work. The high social significance of this activity was also recognized by the authorities. “Mayakovsky, together with Rodchenko, by order of Mosselprom, new candy wrappers, drawings and propaganda lines are being made. Series planned” “Leaders of the Revolution”, “Industry”, “Red Moscow”. The propaganda significance of this undertaking lies not only in couplets, but also in the displacement of the former “candy” names and drawings by those that clearly indicate the revolutionary-industrial tendency of the Soviet Republic. For the taste of the mass is formed not only, say, by Pushkin, but also by each pattern of wallpaper ... ”, — wrote Pravda on March 30, 1924.

It was as a graphic designer in 1925 that Alexander Mikhailovich first and last time in his life he went abroad - to work in the Soviet pavilion at the Paris Exhibition of Decorative Arts and Art Industry. Even then, Picasso, Van Doesburg, Léger wanted to get acquainted with Rodchenko, who watched the development of Soviet art with great interest. It is believed that this meeting did not take place due to the language barrier. By the way, Rodchenko was not impressed by bourgeois Europe, even disappointed. The 35-year-old Soviet constructivist could not understand how one could make things technically so perfect and so empty ideologically. A thing should be an equal comrade of man, Rodchenko is sure, and in this parity lies the light that the growing Soviet civilization brings to the whole world. The things-friends with which he equips the interior of the Soviet pavilion make Alexander Mikhailovich famous throughout the world. But he is bored in Paris, he is annoyed even by exquisite Western clothes. For ideological reasons, he smears the floor in the pavilion with soot so that visitors spread the soot of Soviet industrialization throughout the exhibition. However, this did not prevent Rodchenko from receiving a Silver medal in Paris in the “Street Art” section.

Paris Exhibition of Decorative Arts, 1925

At all stages, Rodchenko's work was inextricably linked with advanced scientific and technical ideas. So sooner or later, Alexander Mikhailovich, with his craving for everything new, simply could not help but turn to photography - the brainchild of science and technology. (read about how photography became accessible to the general public in the history). FROM Rodchenko began to take in 1924. He bought the first camera to work on an advertising photomontage, and borrowed money for an enlarger from Mayakovsky. By the way, it was during that period that Rodchenko made several photographic portraits of the poet, which later became the most famous photographs of Mayakovsky. Contrary to all Soviet canons, Vladimir Vladimirovich in the photo looks like a real dandy, a textured handsome man, a kind of imposing American dandy in expensive suits, and not in serial prozoodezhda.

No less famous is Rodchenko's "Portrait of a Mother", as well as photo portraits of Sergei Tretyakov, Esther Shub, Alexander Shevchenko, Osip Brik and other colleagues in the creative workshop. It is difficult today to find a person who would not see the textbook pictures “Girl with a watering can” and “Radio listener”, and designers use Lily Brik’s photo taken for Lengiz’s advertisement to this day, adapting anything for advertising. Alexander Mikhailovich shot Lilya Brik back in 1924. Almost a century has passed, but the inviting beauty in a scarf still looks very fresh and relevant. And so much so that in our time her image is used even abroad:

Alexander Mikhailovich turned photography into a means of cultural communication, gradually revealing its creative possibilities, its sociality, documentary nature, technical perfection, and modernity. Photography, according to Rodchenko, was to become the only true art that most accurately reflects life in its dynamics, in motion. And the constantly changing Soviet Union under construction was an excellent testing ground for this activity. Alexander Mikhailovich filmed his contemporaries, Moscow, sports, new buildings, the first Soviet technology. With his first uncomfortable apparatus 9x12, and then "Leika", he "clicked" the workers, NEPmen, demonstrators, the flea market near the trams, the contrasts of old and new life in Moscow. And yet - a lot and talentedly photographed children, toddlers and pioneers, feeling in them "inhabitants of a new era."

He campaigned with photography for a new world and way of life, a new visual culture. And the new art that he loved so much required an innovative approach. Experimenter Rodchenko was in no way satisfied with the standard horizontal composition and rectilinear foreshortening, which were considered an “unbreakable tradition” for the vast majority of photographers of that time. Not surprisingly, completely new terms soon appeared in the professional environment - “Rodchenko's perspective” and “Rodchenko's false perspective”. And soon the world learned about what a unique "Rodchenko's composition" is.

A frame in a sharp perspective from below or from above - many criticized him for this composition, but at the same time, they did not hesitate to imitate. Rodchenko's style made his photographs unmistakable. The viewer is forced either to throw his head high, looking at the tops of the pines, or to glance down from the balcony. Taking pictures of architectural objects, he gave them an almost physically tangible dynamics, turning into constructivism something that did not exist at all. “They say they are tired of Rodchenko's pictures - everything is “top down” and “bottom up”. But “from the middle to the middle” - this is how they shoot for a hundred years; it is necessary not only that I, but also the majority, shoot “from the bottom up” and “from the top down”. And I will be “side to side”,- answered his envious master. Under the influence of his ideas, a whole trend of “working photo correspondents” arose in Soviet photography. From this school came the best Soviet photographers of the 30s - Arkady Shaikhet, Boris Ignatovich, Mark Alpert.

However, there were complaints about the photographs of Rodchenko, to which it was impossible not to respond - of an ideological nature. So, for example, some critics blamed the politically incorrectness of his famous Pioneer Trumpeter, taken from the bottom point, which supposedly looks like a “fat bourgeois”. “Is it possible to recognize the lively, joyful, open face of the younger generation of communists in this rough bestial knot of muscles and the clumsy image of the face?”,- newspapers wrote, accusing Rodchenko of formalism and unwillingness to reorganize in accordance with the tasks of proletarian photography. However, very little time will pass, and the well-fed, cheeky pioneer will become the universally recognized standard of socialist realism, designed to become the personification of a happy Soviet childhood(see note ).
But there were also claims of a different kind - and it was far from always possible to dismiss them. Here, for example, what kind of response received his picture "Pioneer": “Why is the pioneer looking up?! Pioneer does not dare to look up, it is not ideological. Pioneers and Komsomol members should look ahead. Alexander Mikhailovich remembered this lesson; from now on, most of his photographic images will be “forward-looking”. Perhaps it was during this period that Rodchenko first encountered ideological pressure on his art. At least this question occupies his mind: “Nothing is so punished in art as conciliation”, he writes at this time.

Girl with a watering can

But conciliation gradually enters into his life more and more. Including personal. In 1934, Rodchenko takes one of his most famous photographs - "Girl with a Watering Can", which depicts his admirer and student Yevgenia Lemberg. The appearance of Lemberg shook Rodchenko's long-term family and creative union with Varvara Stepanova. The romance was stormy, and many believed that Rodchenko, of course, would not "love on two fronts." But nothing happened, Rodchenko remained in the family. And in the summer of 1934, Zhenya Lemberg died in a railway accident. Rodchenko was supposed to go with her, but he postponed the trip for a day. Two years later, Rodchenko wrote in his diary: “Varvara’s love for me is unusually deep ... But for Varvara as a woman after Zhenya, nevertheless, feelings do not come back ...”. Three more years will pass and still: “Today Zhenya was dreaming quite realistically, as if she had arrived ... I was so happy ...”. In 1992, the photograph "Girl with a watering can", which Rodchenko took a few months before the tragic death of Lemberg, will be sold at the Cristies auction for 115 thousand pounds.

Meanwhile, Rodchenko himself is not only successfully integrating into the new Soviet society, but also rapidly climbing the social ladder. Formerly an avant-garde artist and engineer, he is now a well-known designer and leading photojournalist for many Soviet newspapers and magazines; his work appears in international exhibitions. In the 1930s, Rodchenko and his wife worked on the design of photo books and photo albums “First Cavalry”, “Red Army”, “10 Years of Uzbekistan”, “Moscow” and many others. These publications had a minimum of text, the entire burden of semantic perception fell entirely on documentary photographic material. Rodchenko became, as it were, a director of visual books, scrupulously developing each spread, selecting pictures and images, like words in a text. His faithful lens was increasingly aimed at solemn processions, pompous presentations of the achievements of the Soviet economy, mass sports holidays, military parades on Red Square. Did the talented creator catch the moment from which he began to turn into a "singer" of the Stalin era, or was he so carried away by the evolution of his skill that he did not notice the changes? Be that as it may, even in this harmonious choir Rodchenko managed to solo. And he did it selflessly, enjoying both the process and the result.

Rodchenko on the White Sea Canal with his beloved Leika

In 1933, the "moment of truth" came in Rodchenko's fate, after which the artist could no longer pretend that he did not notice what was happening in the country. The United State Political Directorate (OGPU - which later became the NKVD) sent Rodchenko to hone his "forward looking" skills not just anywhere, but to the White Sea-Baltic Canal - one of the first "great" construction sites of communism. The tasks of Alexander Mikhailovich included the organization of an experimental photo laboratory on site, as well as the creation of a series of reports on the completion of construction and the grand opening of the canal. Could the artist not understand what was happening at the “construction site of the century”, by whose forces and at what cost the canal was laid, how many lives it claimed? Could Rodchenko not see that the people whose happy faces were noticed on the streets of Soviet cities by his lens are dying here from hard labor, hunger, and cold. That they are buried in common graves in neighboring forests. Probably couldn't. But he remained at the construction site and enthusiastically set about fulfilling the honorary mission entrusted to him - all the outstanding talent of the constructivist artist went to "photomontage of reality."

Rodchenko flew to the White Sea Canal three times. It is assumed that his local photo archive contains about 4,000 negatives, but most of them have not yet been found. Currently, about 40 works made by Alexander Mikhailovich on the White Sea Canal are known. Among them are landscapes of northern nature of amazing beauty, but mostly these are weekdays and holidays of the “great” construction - their varnished and powdered image. And, as can be understood from Rodchenko's letters to his wife, this work gives him pleasure. In these messages, he enthusiastically describes the events taking place in BelBaltlag as a great achievement of Soviet power: “Over 20 months, about 20,000 qualified workers have been trained in 40 specialties. These are all former thieves, kulaks, pests and murderers. They first learned the poetry of labor, the romance of construction. They worked to the music of their own orchestras.” It is not known how sincere Rodchenko was in these assessments of his "business trip" - after all, it was obvious to him that all mail correspondence was carefully checked by "authorities". Most likely, what he saw at the construction of the canal forced Rodchenko to try with all his might to avoid being on the other side of the barbed wire, which often happened even with service personnel"great construction" (read about one such case in the note).
By the way, the picture “The Brass Band of the White Sea-Baltic Canal”, the original of which is stored in the Archive of the BBK NKVD Directorate of Medvezhyegorsk, went around the whole world and is considered one of the most iconic and symbolic in this series: Rodchenko captured from the top point how the brass band of the Canal Army “build and helps to live" to less musically gifted prisoners.

And now we offer to compare Rodchenko's view of the "great" construction project with the perception of his own staff by Natalia Solzhenitsyna. Here is how the writer's wife recalled one of Rodchenko's photographs: “I shuddered when I saw the photo! This half-dressed crowd in the snowy haze, the logs or crowbars that they carry are like peaks of some Time of Troubles. The dense back of the Chekist on the shore above them. He is alone - but the crowd of people is submissive. In a blizzard, they are drawn into the channel, as in Dante's circle. Manually gnaw through a channel that will practically not be used. Like many "great construction projects".

And, of course, no "romance and poetry of labor", which was so admired (at least in public) by the author of the pictures. Did Rodchenko himself see this romance? It seems that at first Alexander Mikhailovich really believed in what he was filming and writing. Three years later, the photographer, hoping to stop the harassment against him by the Soviet Photo magazine, will write an article “Restructuring the Artist”, where he will remember the White Sea Canal as the most important stage in his biography. “Giant will collected the dregs of the past on the channel. And this will managed to raise people's enthusiasm, the artist writes. Rodchenko has in mind not only the army of builders, but also himself: they say that the great construction even re-educated him. “I want to resolutely refuse in the future to put the formal solution of the topic in the first place, and the ideological solution in the second place, and along with this, inquisitively look for new riches of the photographic language, in order to create things with its help that stand at a high political and artistic level, things in which the photographic language would serve fully socialist realism”,- Rodchenko swears allegiance to socialist realism. It's hard not to believe him, he's absolutely sincere.

The place of execution and burial on the Belomorkanal. Photo: Oleg Klimov

On the basis of Rodchenko’s canal army photo archive, a special issue of the magazine “USSR at a Construction Site” (issue for December 1933) was prepared, which was published on three foreign languages and spread, including among the Soviet elite. The magazine published photographs of Alexander Mikhailovich, made using "hidden mounting", sole purpose which is to present slave labor as pleasure. And it was done very skillfully, even talentedly. If at all one can call lies and propaganda art, covering up crimes against humanity, leveling grave pits with the ground, in which 100-200 people were shot in the back of the head.

The book "The Stalin Canal" from the collection "Little Stories"

A significant part of Rodchenko's photo archive was included in the book "Stalin's Channel". This 600-page volume, edited by Maxim Gorky, was compiled by the group Soviet writers, for which, shortly after the opening of the channel in August 1933, a special excursion tour was organized. The publication is a bibliographic rarity: almost its entire circulation was destroyed in 1937, since the leaders of the channel close to Genrikh Yagoda (one of the main “heroes” of the book) were suddenly branded “enemies of the people”, and not all writers survived. This book has been out of print for almost 70 years. The collection of "Little Stories" contains one of the surviving copies of this rare edition. One can relate differently to that time, to that social system, to this book and its authors, but it would be a mistake to deny its value - after all, this is evidence of an entire era. tragic era. And even though this document is very subjective, we still have almost no others left. We will certainly leaf through it, but first we will turn to the very cruise that was organized for the Soviet creative elite to the site of the construction of the first shipping canal in the USSR.

Just before the opening, a group of 120 writers and artists arrived at the White Sea Canal on the ship Karl Marx. It included Maxim Gorky and Alexei Tolstoy, favored by the authorities. The delegation also included Mikhail Zoshchenko, Vsevolod Ivanov, Viktor Shklovsky, Ilya Ilf and Evgeny Petrov, Bruno Yasensky, Valentin Kataev, Vera Inber, Sergey Budantsev, Dmitry Mirsky and many others. Rodchenko was instructed to capture this epoch-making event. In addition, he was allowed to film writers along with the OGPU guards and its chief Naftaliy Frenkel, which so far has not been allowed to any photojournalist. Rodchenko prepared for the responsible task with particular enthusiasm, as evidenced again by his letter to his wife: “I will film their arrival and passage on the steamer, I will immediately develop and print. You will immediately realize the pictures in the newspapers ... It will be great, right?

And the writers' trip turned out to be very funny. This is how the young 25-year-old prose writer Alexander Avdeenko described this journey. : “We eat and drink according to our needs, we don’t pay for anything. Smoked sausages. Cheeses. Caviar. Fruit. Chocolate. Guilt. Cognac. And this is in a hungry year! I eat, drink and bitterly remember the train Magnitogorsk - Moscow ... Everywhere along the canvas stood ragged, barefoot, emaciated children, old people. Skin and bones, living relics. And everyone stretches their hands to the cars passing by. And everyone has one, easily guessed word on their lips: bread, bread, bread ... Writers wander around the cars. Corks pop, glasses clink. Laughter and noisy conversations do not stop ... I envy every burst of laughter ... ".

A group of writers with the head of the BelBaltlag Semyon Firin. 1933

Having reached the place, the writers were not sad either - parties, bonfires with a guitar, the release of a humorous wall newspaper with poems and cartoons. In general, the atmosphere is creative and cheerful - just like a pioneer camp. And already in August of the same 1933, immediately after the opening of the White Sea Canal, the writers participating in the trip received a government order for a book about the “great” construction site. So Stalin forced the Soviet creative elite not only to swear allegiance to the cause of the party, but also to sing something that instilled horror in all Soviet citizens - the Gulag system. The task set before the writers' brethren was very clearly formulated by Maxim Gorky: “No mysticism, no miracles, the pedagogy of the OGPU as a convincing explanation to the prisoners of the whole essence of the processes taking place in the country ... We call ourselves the first literary collective farm in the USSR.” The literary collective farm, which, in addition to Gorky himself, included Mikhail Zoshchenko, Alexei Tolstoy, Vsevolod Ivanov, Vera Inber, Valentin Kataev, Lev Nikulin, Viktor Shklovsky, Bruno Yasensky, Anna Berzin, Grigory Gauzner, Lev Slavin, Dmitry Mirsky (total 36 "engineers human souls”) completed the task in record time - in six months. On January 20, 1934, the edition was printed in the printing house.

Spread of the Ogonyok magazine on the eve of the publication of a book about the White Sea Canal

The book was published under the editorship of M. Gorky, L. Averbakh and S. Firin. Here is how the “petrel of the revolution” responded about the results of this creative activity and the significance of the construction itself: “The work on the book about Belomorstroy showed how far the process of approaching the Party of the bulk of non-Party Soviet writers really went. We have written a book about a channel created on the initiative of Comrade Stalin and bearing his name. It put on us civil liability and joyfully excited each member of our team. The book tells about the victory of a small group of people, disciplined by the idea of ​​communism, over tens of thousands of socially harmful units. This book tells how the sick were treated; how the enemies of the proletariat were re-educated into its employees and comrades-in-arms.

The book was published in two formats, printed in Moscow and Leningrad. A large deluxe edition of the in-quatro (about 30 cm in height), apparently, was intended for solemn presentation on official occasions. It was published in a small edition of 10,000 copies, without price indication. On the other - in-octavo (about 20 cm in height) - the price was 9 rubles 50 kopecks. The circulation of this version was 30,000 copies - also, by the way, quite a bit by Soviet standards. This is exactly what we have in our collection. It is noteworthy that the book was also published on English language- the translation was made in Moscow by the American socialist Amabel Williams-Ellis and used for the American and British editions.

The authors of the book thoroughly approached its creation, used all their creative potential. The main plot outline, reflecting the most important milestones of the "great construction", was diluted different kind digressions, inserted humorous episodes and original stories from the life of the Canal Army and OGPU employees, diversified the narrative with techniques typical of fiction. The task of the "literary collective farm" was very difficult. Firstly, the book was supposed to exclude even the slightest possibility of a different interpretation of the events described. Secondly, a single narrative should have turned out, an artistic monolith, far from a collection of works by different authors. Thirdly, for all its apparent artistry, this truly propaganda product was supposed to give the reader the impression of documentary and authenticity. To create this illusion, the narrative was interspersed with official notes and eyewitness accounts.

Map from the book "The Stalin Canal"

Here is how the authors themselves spoke about their literary creation. Writer Leonid Leonov: “Perhaps the most valuable thing in the system of Belomorstroy, and consequently, the OGPU, is the high art of cleverly and strictly sparing people who are destined by all our vile past for the terrible and now avoided role of human scrap ...”. Mikhail Kozakov echoed him: “ OGPU is a school of social pedagogy. Thanks to the OGPU, everyone in his place can build the most freedom-loving socialist society…”. Here is another quote: I was stunned by what I saw of the wealth of drummers-kanalstroevtsev. Sturgeon fish lay on large dishes under the transparent thickness of the aspic. Pieces of tesha, salmon, and salmon were bathed in fat on narrow plates. A large number of plates were littered with rings of sausage, ham, cheese. Fresh radishes blazed…”. And the words of Lev Nikulin give off absolutely transcendent cynicism: "The highest humanity and humanity was made by the Chekists, the first builders of the channel, and it consists in the excellent work on the correction of man." Apparently, thanks to this "humanity" for a year and a half of work, almost 100 thousand people died, that is, every second prisoner.

"Happy" Canal Army Men

Of course, it is difficult to accuse the "masters of the pen" gathered on the ship in cooperation with the authorities. For most of them, there was no other choice. However, we note in passing that even in these years, many representatives of the intelligentsia found the strength and courage in themselves, at least for an allegorical depiction of the true state of affairs in the country. An example here is the outwardly quite loyal to the Soviet government artist Kuzma Sergeevich Petrov-Vodkin, who, according to many art critics, encoded all the horror of the 30s in his famous painting"Anxiety. 1919".

K.S. Petrov-Vodkin. "Anxiety. 1919".

Written in 1934, the picture was read by contemporaries almost unequivocally: the employee's family is horrified by the arrest. The father of the family anxiously looks out the night window - perhaps he is waiting for the arrival of the "funnel". A small clue is also contained on the front page of a crumpled newspaper, the title of which is guessed "Krasnaya Gazeta" (the publication was published from 1918 to 1939). Right under the "header" with the name of the newspaper, we see a headline beginning with the word "Enemy .." The last three letters of the heading suggest options - either an enemy of the people, or an enemy of labor. But in any case, this is more from the vocabulary of the 30s than from the time of the civil war. Realizing that such a significant work would certainly be viewed under a microscope, Petrov-Vodkin made sure that the headline "Krasnaya Gazeta" was more reminiscent of the one under which it was published before 1926.
The same Petrov-Vodkin is also known for his other "talking" painting - "Housewarming". On it we see a large family that, according to the legend of Petrov-Vodkin himself, moved into an apartment vacated from the bourgeoisie on Palace Embankment in Petrograd. In the picture we see a rather complex composition, consisting of a smiling new owner, similar to Lenin and Stalin at the same time (fortunately with a pipe in his hand), sitting surrounded by his comrades at the table on the left. The rest of the space is filled with different people, among which young workers, peasants and military men are guessed. Pre-revolutionary portraits on the wall look at this audience with some horror.

The artist himself, in his subsequent interviews, could not intelligibly explain what the idea of ​​the painting was. He complained that he went into details, led the viewer away from the storyline. Probably in 1937, when this picture was painted, otherwise it was simply impossible to answer. In the meantime, the author's ideological intention becomes absolutely clear if we remember that even in the 30s, "housewarming" was often held in the apartments of arrested "enemies of the people" (how can one not recall here Bulgakov's "housing problem ruined them"). A lot is said about the past owners in the picture - both the icon in the corner on the right, and the elegant painting on the walls, which conflicts with the peasants and workers who have moved to a new house. And also a carpet under the table - carelessly thrown next to a rug, obviously brought here by new tenants. So Petrov-Vodkin was not disingenuous, saying that he oversaturated the picture with new characters. He did not say only one thing - that thanks to this, the former owners became the main character of the picture. They are not there - but their presence (or absence) is clearly felt. A detail that is not striking at first glance: in the center of the picture, right behind the backs of the girl and the wounded Red Army soldier, there is a mirror. It reflects the heads of a girl and a fighter, and also a pipe from a potbelly stove. And also - a table (or chest of drawers) filled with dishes with a picture on the wall. But this table is not in the room - pay attention, it is reflected only in the mirror. And no one is sitting at this table. Perhaps this is a reflection of the former life, and the owners, who are no longer there.
It is not surprising that this painting by Petrov-Vodkin has always attracted the attention of art critics and historians. The most meticulous of them even “figured out” the address of the building from which such a view of the Peter and Paul Fortress opens - this is the former tenement house of N.P. "Hermitage" and elite apartments with daily rent.

House on Millionnaya, 11 in St. Petersburg today

Returning to the participants of the Stalinist "press tour" along the White Sea Canal, we note that among them there was a person who flatly refused to participate in writing a book about the educational role of the Gulag. It was the writer Vyacheslav Shishkov. And what is surprising: this demarche got away with it. The authorities did not touch Shishkov. But with other - more loyal writers from that same ship, they were treated much harshly. We will not touch on the strange death of Maxim Gorky, about which many books have been written, but in a nutshell we will tell about how other chroniclers of the White Sea Canal ended their earthly journey:

In the summer of 1937, he was removed from all positions, expelled from the Writers' Union "for counter-revolutionary activities", shot on September 17, 1938.
Anna Berzin- wife of Bruno Yasensky, arrested in 1938, spent more than 17 years in the Gulag and in the settlement.
- arrested in 1937, sentenced on "suspicion of espionage" to 8 years of corrective labor, in June 1939 he died in a camp near Magadan.
Sergey Budantsev- On April 26, 1938, he was arrested and sentenced to 8 years in camps on charges of "counter-revolutionary propaganda." In the summer of 1939 he was transferred to Kolyma, where he worked as a miner at a gold mine. He died in the camp "Invalidny" in 1940.
Semyon Gekht- in May 1944 he was arrested, sentenced to 8 years for "anti-Soviet agitation." After serving his term, in 1952 he settled in Kaluga.

The design of the book, including the main part of the photographs, was handled, as we have already noted, by Alexander Rodchenko. It is not known for certain whether his decision to work at the White Sea Canal was voluntary or whether he was made an offer "that cannot be refused." It is possible that this creative order has become a natural continuation of a long-standing relationship with the authorities. Be that as it may, Rodchenko collaborated with the OGPU - otherwise he simply would not have the privileges that he enjoyed while at a construction site. Alexander Mikhailovich could move freely around the territory of the zone, he was granted the exclusive right to film not only ordinary canal soldiers, but also their guards. From the same letters to his wife, it is known that Rodchenko created all the conditions for work and quite comfortable living: “I didn’t write because of ignorance of where, what, and the lack of a pass. Now everything is all right. I am healthy and looking good. I eat, I drink, I sleep, and I don't work yet, but I'll start tomorrow. Everything is wonderfully interesting. While I'm resting. The conditions are excellent ... Do not tell anyone too much that I am on the White Sea Canal ... "

Some researchers of the biography of Alexander Rodchenko suggest that his connection with the OGPU goes back to the times when he was frequent guest in the house of Lily Brik - and historians have recently considered her cooperation with the "authorities" proven. This zigzag in Rodchenko's life could not but affect the perception of his work. For many, virtuoso techniques for "photomontage of reality" crossed out all the previous achievements of Alexander Mikhailovich in painting and photography. The famous “Rodchenko angles” ceased to be a new word in art, but turned in the minds of some viewers into symbols of propaganda of the Stalinist regime. A vivid example of this is an interview with the writer, historian, friend of Malevich and Tatlin, a member of the artistic community of Russian avant-garde artists Nikolai Khardzhiev, which he gave in 1991:

“And Rodchenko is generally rubbish and complete nonentity. Zero. He appeared in 1916, when everything had already taken place, even Suprematism. Popova and Udaltsova nevertheless appeared in 1913, Rozanova in 1911. And he came to everything ready and did not understand anything. He hated everyone and envied everyone. Rubbish was an incredible person. Malevich and Tatlin treated him with irony and contempt - for them he was a comic figure. Lissitzky did not express anything about him, but he also treated him contemptuously, while Rodchenko envied him terribly and hated him. Rodchenko made a bunch of drawing covers for Mayakovsky, and Lissitzky made one (the second bad one) for Golos – does Rodchenko have anything like that? When he began to study photography and photomontage, there were already wonderful masters in the West - Man Ray and others. Lissitzky already followed Man Ray, but no worse. That there were artists, but this one had photographs - from above, from below - just nonsense. I believe that there was no such artist.”

Our contemporary photojournalist Oleg Klimov sees what happened to Rodchenko as the tragedy of all Russian photojournalism: “Throughout history, our “documentary photography” has been nothing more than propaganda of one regime or another. She did not talk about a person and society, but promoted bloody regimes, dictators, replacing the concept of terror with the concept of re-educating thieves, prostitutes, enemies of the people. The beginning of this in photography was the White Sea Canal, and Rodchenko did it for the first time under the leadership of the OGPU. It is a myth that he was persecuted by the Soviet government for "left art". Most likely, he became despised by this very power, in the service of which he was until the end of his days. Therefore, this is not only a personal tragedy for Rodchenko, it has become a tragedy for most domestic photographers and photography in general: in the discrepancy between the reflection of the inner world and the outer world.

Indeed, it was a tragedy not only for Alexander Rodchenko - for many other Soviet creators, the work on such monographs became the same hard-to-explain episode in the biography, by and large - a shameful stain. Power made them not just bend, but love her with due sincerity, which was fueled by fear. It is with Bulgakov that the poet Bezdomny and the Master choose between prison, madness and suicide. But the reality was even darker and more tragic. There were no magical transformations, and before the triumph of justice remained for many decades. In the meantime, only fear remained, forcing them to write such books, which, following Solzhenitsyn, émigré historians dubbed "the most vile book in the history of literature, glorifying concentration camps."

How, for example, managed to get into the authors of the book "Stalin's White Sea Canal" Pole Bruno Jasensky- the author of "Conspiracy of the Indifferent"? It is to him that the world-famous words belong: “Don't be afraid of your enemies - in the worst case, they can kill you. Do not be afraid of friends - in the worst case, they can betray you. Fear the indifferent - they do not kill and do not betray, but only with their tacit consent does betrayal and murder exist on earth.. Yasensky wrote these lines in 1937, three years after the publication of the book about the White Sea Canal. Isn't this the most capacious description of what happened to the Soviet people under the Stalinist regime? Isn't he talking here about himself and his colleagues, who are forced to sing about any lawlessness of the authorities - even the system of concentration camps and slave labor created by it?

I sanctify sin with melancholy.
I feel sorry for the bad guys
as Alexei Tolstoy

Their juice has gone into the sand,
So that, adapting to the age,
For a tasty morsel
Give talent and conscience.
I shed tears for two
But they all have no limits
Whose spirit has decayed
Faster than the flesh decayed.
And the Face died
Not recognizing myself
Under the cadaverous laziness
Flatterer and eloquent.

These are lines from the poem "Regret" by the poet Boris Chichibabin, written in 1969. Laureate of 3 Stalin Prizes died a quarter of a century before their appearance. It turns out that many descendants did not forgive him for servility to the criminal authorities. Why did a talented writer who once hated the Bolsheviks, who fled from them into exile, wrote there the wonderful "Childhood of Nikita", suddenly decide to devote himself to glorifying Stalin's conquests? The writer and literary critic Alexei Varlamov tried to understand this phenomenon: “In 1923, Alexei Tolstoy returned to Russia, but already in Soviet Russia. Psychologically, he is ready to build a new empire. Remember his dispute with Bunin. Remember what Bunin wrote about Alexei Tolstoy. The mission of the Russian emigration was to preserve the true Russia, its spiritual beginning. One can argue how utopian this idea was. But she was. For Ivan Bunin, Soviet Russia is an oxymoron, a combination of the incongruous. Red Russia for Alexei Tolstoy is real. Now he accepts Bolshevik Russia. Yes, he always lived richly, on a grand scale. Yes, he liked to be mean, which he himself admitted. Alexey Tolstoy for me is not a communist in essence, but a Russian statesman.

But, unlike Tolstoy, for more than 20 years he lived with the realization of how ambiguous some contemporaries treat him. Few people know that the fate of the author of "The Lonely Sail Turns White" was tragic and full of secrets. In his autobiography, he always mentioned that in civil war fought on the side of the Red Army, was always loyal to the Bolsheviks. However, in his declining years, Valentin Petrovich spoke publicly about his participation in the White movement. Interestingly, historians and biographers see hints of this fact in some early works Kataev. The same version is confirmed by the memories of the Bunin family. By the way, in the relationship between Kataev and Bunin, too, not everything is clear. Valentin Petrovich liked to mention that Bunin was his teacher, talked a lot with him before the revolution in Odessa. However, Ivan Alekseevich himself did not confirm the fact of "teaching" and spoke very harshly about his "student" in his diary entries " cursed days»: “There was V. Kataev (a young writer). The cynicism of today's young people is downright incredible. He said: “For a hundred thousand I will kill anyone. I want to eat well, I want to have a good hat, great shoes…”
In the 1920s, Kataev worked for the Gudok newspaper and other publications, where he wrote "topical" humorous stories. In 1933, as we already know, he took part in writing a monograph on the "great construction". However, in 1938, unexpectedly for many, he spoke in defense of the disgraced Osip Mandelstam, and before the arrest of the poet helped him with money, organized an illegal meeting with Alexander Fadeev at his apartment. After the war, Kataev drank a lot. Having coped with the illness, in the early 50s he founded and headed the magazine "Youth". I tried to collect on its pages the works of young interesting authors, whose views were distinguished by novelty and did not fit into the framework of socialist realism. For this he was often severely criticized. But further in the biography of Kataev, completely contradictory episodes are again observed. In 1966, he committed an act that did not fit in at all with the image of the author of the Channel. Stalin" - signed a collective letter of cultural figures to Leonid Brezhnev against the rehabilitation of Stalin. However, in 1973, Kataev also actively participated in the persecution of Sakharov and Solzhenitsyn, again signing a collective letter to the Pravda newspaper. After 6 years, a new zigzag - publication in the magazine " New world The story “Werther has already been written” causes a huge scandal. It is called anti-Soviet - in it the 83-year-old writer spoke about his participation in the White movement. And this, mind you, in 1979, during the period of deep Brezhnev's "stagnation", when such public confessions were still very far away. One can only guess what kind of mental torment and torment this talented person experienced throughout his life.

The fate of another author of the monograph on the White Sea Canal was not easy - Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky. A representative of a princely family, a member of the White movement, the author of the English-language "History of Russian Literature", which Vladimir Nabokov called "the best history of Russian literature in any language, including Russian", lived in exile for more than 10 years. However, in Europe, Marxist views become close to him. Over time, he joins the Communist Party of Great Britain, visits Gorky in Capri and, with the assistance of the latter, moves to the USSR in 1932. Further, events developed rapidly: two years later he writes a chapter for a book presented in our collection, three years later he is arrested, and two more years later he dies in the camp. Most likely, initially Mirsky was guided by a sincere impulse to return to his homeland, to actively participate in her fate in difficult times. This impulse cost him his life. It is known that Mirsky, in conversations with other participants in the trip to the White Sea Canal, repeatedly expressed doubts about the correspondence of the official image of the “construction of the century” to the actual state of affairs. And it was very dangerous to doubt the loyalty of the Stalinist course in the USSR.

He was guided by motives different from others, giving his consent to a writer's excursion and the subsequent writing of a book, a literary critic. Once a Socialist-Revolutionary, a participant in the February Revolution in early 1922, he was forced to flee to Finland. But a year and a half later he returned to the USSR for personal reasons. His older brother was shot as a right SR, and his sister died in Petrograd. Only brother Vladimir survived. It was because of him that Viktor Shklovsky agreed to join Gorky's "literary collective farm". He just wanted to see his brother, who is serving a sentence in that very BelBaltlag, and, if possible, to alleviate the fate of his relative. The OGPU officer accompanying the writer asked how Shklovsky felt in this place, to which he received an answer: "Like a live fox in a fur shop." This act did not save his brother: in November 1937, Vladimir Shklovsky was shot. The writer himself, forced to glorify the "construction of the century" that killed him loved one lived to a ripe old age and died in 1984.

Unusual and tragic fate of the poet Sergei Alymov. When a writer's excursion arrived at the "construction site of the century" in 1933, Alymov was serving time there, editing a newspaper for prisoners. During communication with the Canal Army, one of the colleagues recognized the poet. No matter how hard Sergei Yakovlevich tried to play the role of a happy re-educated prisoner in a conversation, he still could not stand it and burst into tears. The writers turned to Semyon Firin, who was present right there, with a request to reduce Alymov's term. Firin promised that the poet would soon be in Moscow and kept his word. Soon Sergei Alymov arrived in the capital, where he joined the work on a book about the "great construction", praising the Gulag system, of which he himself had recently been a victim. Can he be blamed for this?

About the writer, poet and theater critic Grigory Gauzner, who also had a hand in the monograph on the White Sea Canal, not much is known. But excerpts from his diary have survived to this day, which explain a lot in his actions, including participation in writing the Gulag anthem: “How much more difficult is my way than Babel's way. He is smarter than me: coming to the lower ones, he remained himself. And I, like a naive fool, out of honesty myself tried to become inferior. I tried my best to suppress myself... I struggled to become a pig. How difficult it is for me now to stand on two legs, jumping on all fours. Grigory Gauzner died suddenly at the age of 27, just six months after the release of the White Sea Canal named after Stalin.

It is worth mentioning the fate Alexandra Avdeenko, as young on a writer's excursion as Gausner. We have already cited above Avdeenko's memories of how fun the creative trip to the White Sea Canal was. The young prose writer, a miner in the recent past, was sincerely horrified by what he saw at the "construction site of the century." The naive young man innocently shared his impressions with his colleagues, this information reached the head of the BelBaltlag, Semyon Firin. Avdeenko avoided arrest, but did not get into the composition of the authors of the book. Alexander was forced to literally flee to his native mine, practically go underground, forgetting about his writing career for many years. Many years later, Avdeenko wrote a story-memoir of the 30s "Excommunication". Readers met her only in 1989.

It is quite natural to consider the appearance in the group of authors of the writer's monograph Kuzma Gorbunova. Born into a peasant family, he received a "start in life" at the workers' faculty, worked in the newspapers "Red Harvest", "Proletarian Ways", "Red Volga Region", later in the magazines "Krasnaya Niva", "Change", "Young Guard". In 1929 he published the novel "Ice Breaker" about peasant life, fighting the poor with their fists. Gorky highly appreciated this book, so writing career Gorbunova went uphill. Cruise with writers to Belomor, co-authored with colleagues three chapters for a monograph, participation in the preparation of the 1st writers' congress, a new novel, this time about the fate of a worker, essays on the exploits of Soviet people in wartime and peacetime. And so on until the end of life without zigzags and upheavals.

It was not a shock, apparently, participation in the chanting of the Gulag and for writer Sergei Dikovsky. Having acted as a co-author of two chapters of the monograph, he wrote several more stories and essays on the re-education of people through labor. Later they were combined into a collection under the general title "Crime and Education". literary critic Kornely Zelinsky known mainly for three facts of his quite prosperous biography. He was one of the co-founders and main theorist of the constructivist group, took part in the creation of the book "Stalin's Channel", participated in the campaign against Boris Pasternak. For some reason, after working on the monograph, Zelinsky withdrew from active participation in literary activity for almost 20 years.

The reasons why among the glorifiers of the Gulag were Mikhail Zoshchenko and Vsevolod Ivanov, partly explained Tamara Ivanova, the wife of the writer, who also visited BelBaltlag. Her revelations are dated 1989: “They showed for me personally even then the obvious “Potemkin villages”. I could not help asking Vsevolod and Mikhal Mikhalych Zoshchenko: can’t you see that the performances of “reforged” criminals in front of you are a theatrical performance, and cottages in front gardens, with paths strewn with clean sand, with flowers in flower beds, are just theatrical scenery ? They sincerely answered me (both believed in the possibility of the so-called “reforging”) that in order to re-educate a person, he must first of all be placed in a very good environment, not at all similar to the one from which he got into the criminal world. - And among the criminals were, of course, the most talented actors. They made such fiery speeches in front of us, they burst into such real tears, according to the Stanislavsky system! And let it seem incredible, but Vsevolod and Mikhal Mikhalych believed them. And most importantly, they wanted to believe!”.

But there were also those who did not want to participate in this farce, who refused to participate in the falsification of history. It is known, for example, that Mikhail Bulgakov received an invitation to take part in an excursion to the White Sea Canal. The writer rejected this proposal - as well as an order for a play about happy life at the "great building". But the playwright agreed. The winner of the Lenin and two Stalin Prizes fit perfectly into the "literary collective farm". True, he did not take part in writing the monograph - at that time he created a comedy in four acts "Aristocrats" about the process of "reforging" people in BelBaltlag. At the end of 1934, this play, directed by Nikolai Okhlopkov, appeared on the stage of the Realistic Theater in Moscow as a New Year's cheerful premiere. And in 1935, "Aristocrats" was staged by Boris Zakhava at the Theater. Vakhtangov. A year later, the film Prisoners, also based on Pogodin's play, was released.

Indirect participation in the creation of a book about the construction of the White Sea Canal was taken by another very famous person close to power - the artist Isaac Brodsky. It was his brush that belongs to the portrait of Stalin, placed on the very first page of our monograph. "Little Stories" has already written in detail about this portrait and its author, one of the founders of socialist realism, Isaac Izrailevich Brodsky in history ). This student of Ilya Repin was a truly unique master and person. For all his incredible and undisguised craving for luxury and a beautiful life, salon gatherings in a European style, connections with disgraced painters and complete apathy, he was incomprehensibly loved by the Soviet authorities. And it happened somehow imperceptibly, by itself.

It was he who set the canons for the image of Lenin and Stalin, it was he who was the only General Secretary who was entrusted to paint a portrait of his mother, it was reproductions of his paintings in the USSR that adorned the streets, offices and apartments, it was Brodsky who reflected in the colors the main milestones of formation Soviet power- from the execution of Baku commissars to the construction of Volkhovstroy. What's in return? A solid ration, a beautiful bunk apartment in the center of Leningrad in the former Villegorsky apartments, where in Pushkin's time there was a famous literary and musical salon, a huge workshop, personal friendship with the powers that be (for example, with Kirov and Gorky), the position of head of the Academy of Arts, hundreds of students , exhibitions and orders, orders, orders ... Brodsky's position is extremely simple: "Do what your boss says and enjoy the benefits they offer in return." He became the first artist to be awarded the Order of Lenin. It turned out quite logically - one of the authors of Leniniana was awarded the Order of Lenin. Brodsky's name at one time was even a household name. In the Leningrad artistic environment of the 1920s, this was the name given to artists who lived according to the principle: "What do you want?"

Thus, it can be argued that by the mid-1930s, conciliation had become everyday occurrence among the creative intelligentsia of the USSR. “From the end of the 1930s, bright personalities, once united by creativity and friendship, began to turn into dull literary officials, bilious inhabitants of Peredelkino dachas, drunken habitues of restaurants, persecuted loners, connected only by random memories. What united poets and what separated them? Why is the word “friend” heard as often in the 1920s as it was in Pushkin’s time, and why by the end of the 1930s was it replaced by the faceless relations of comrades in literary meetings?- asks a rhetorical question in her book "The Knot" literary historian Natalya Gromova.

"Sports column"

So Alexander Rodchenko, having sworn allegiance to socialist realism, was forced to put his art on state rails. However, strict socialist realist canons caused him despondency and melancholy. Some researchers believe that the trip to the White Sea Canal shook his bright faith in the justice of socialism, and with it the desire to engage in propaganda work. Depressive notes are increasingly appearing in his letters. Since the second half of the 1930s, Alexander Mikhailovich has been striving to somehow preserve inner freedom, the symbol of which for him at that time was the images of the circus. At the same time, the famous sports series of photographs was created (one of the most famous photographs is the “Sports Column”). But they no longer bring the former pleasure from work. Rodchenko himself considers his photographs and paintings of that period to be mediocre. It is noteworthy that modern critics do not seem to notice late works Rodchenko, convicted of servility to the authorities. The first two years of the Great patriotic war the artist was evacuated in the Perm region, then returned to Moscow, worked as a freelance photojournalist, designed the TASS Windows. In the post-war years he continued to study photography and painting. Joining the "unofficial art", Rodchenko writes a series of compositions in the spirit of abstract expressionism. By this time in the USSR no one cares about the avant-garde, but this style is in great demand in the West. True, Rodchenko himself, indifferent to capitalist art, never knew about this, and his works are still exhibited and purchased by the world's largest museums.
However, none of the former merits saved Rodchenko from punishment for repeated "retreat from socialist realism." In 1951, he was expelled from the Union of Artists - however, a year after Stalin's death, he was restored back. And two years later, Rodchenko was gone. He is buried at the New Donskoy Cemetery. A year and a half later, the ashes of Varvara Stepanova were also buried here.
But Rodchenko's art outlived him. In the mid-2000s, a surge of interest in the artist and his works flared up in the now new Russia. A surge that coincided with the turn of the state ideology towards the restoration of the USSR. It is difficult to say what is the reason for this increased interest. Either the slender rows of Rodchenko's columns again began to look bewitching for the Russian audience. Whether modern masters of culture have found in Rodchenko and his contemporaries a rationale for what the accommodating muse is pushing them to do...

year 2014. These people have hardly heard of Rodchenko. But willingly subordinate their "I" to the collective unconscious.